


so baby come light me up

by batterwitchofhope



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: 4am grinding in the camaro on the side of a highway, Aftercare, Blue and Ronan friendship, Blue's a big part of their relationship but she's a little background in this particular fic, Car Sex, Cuddling, Dirty Talk, F/M, Fantasizing, Fingering, Fluff and Smut, Gansey's kinky as hell, Grinding, Hickeys, Kissing, Kissing by Proxy, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Ronan's a tease and a half, Smut, Snapchat, Subspace, blue & ronan are platonic only dont worry, blue & ronan are queerplatonic partners!, i honestly don't know how to tag this i'm sorry it's really long and there's a lot of sex, introspective, ive always wanted to use that tag, there's a really sappy scene of ronan praying in here, this is literally just smut and introspective character study fluff interlaced
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-28
Updated: 2016-10-28
Packaged: 2018-08-27 14:50:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8405887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/batterwitchofhope/pseuds/batterwitchofhope
Summary: The third kiss ends with her in Ronan's lap, her back resting against the span of his chest. Her breath comes quick as she watches her boys kissing over her shoulder. She tips her head back against Ronan's shoulder. 
They break apart then, and they look to her for direction. They’re so completely hers, and the heady rush of it races down her spine like the dragging whine of the BMW’s engine with her at the helm. 
“Again,” she whispers. “Like you mean it. Tease him.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> title from "into you" by ariana grande  
> i kind of wrote this as the beginning of a longer fic about the three of them together, meaning i'm completely open to expanding this into a longer multichapter fic if y'all want. let me know!  
> anyways this is a lot of porn and im sorry

“Doesn’t that hurt?”

Gansey looks up at her from where he’s hunched over at his desk at Monmouth, scribbling something in his journal- GPS coordinates maybe, translation of a welsh poem, Cabeswater’s latest mystery. Blue might not know _what_ he’s jotting down, but what she _does_ know is the familiar slant of his messy shorthand, the ink smudges across the edge of his palm, the way his wireframes are slipping down his nose. Gansey-at-night might be her favorite Gansey, when his god-awful boat shoes are nowhere to be found and he’s all unkempt, sweatpants and messy hair and frustrated sighs. 

This Gansey though, hunched over his desk at an angle that can’t possibly be comfortable, is a byproduct of his wretched insomnia, and Blue knows it. She wonders idly if she can still appreciate this version of Gansey while knowing exactly how dark the bags under his eyes are. 

“Does what hurt?” he murmurs, his brows knitting together in confusion. 

She gestures to the hand that’s not busy copying down notes on Glendower; the one that’s busy pressing curious fingertips against the soft purple marks lining his jaw. 

His face blooms pink as he drops the hand from his neck like it’s been burned, and Blue can’t help but laugh softly, the kind of laugh underlined by warmth and fondness, not judgment. Rumpled, late-night Gansey might be her favorite, but blushing, bewildered Gansey is definitely a close second. Gansey sighs in defeat, smiling faintly at the sight of her sprawled out on his bed, and he runs a hand through his hair absently as he surveys the sprawl of paper on his desk one last time before gathering it up, stacking his notes neatly and pressing his journal shut, standing and stretching, his voice cracking with a yawn. 

“A little, but. It’s good hurt.” 

Blue nods thoughtfully. She understands, she thinks. She might not know the dull, pleasant sting-then-ache of day-old hickeys, considering she’s never had one, but she knows the meaning of good hurt. 

(In Blue’s mind, it has a lot to do with hands on gear shifts, breath exhaled hot against cheeks, the scent of mint and wool sweater and vinyl car seats and _Gansey, just Gansey_.)

He makes his way to the edge of the bed, settling down easily, pulling the covers over the both of them and wrapping a strong arm around Blue, pulling her close against him. They’re silent for the space of several moments, surrounded by the sound of cars outside, Henrietta’s summer crickets, the low crackle and hum of the air conditioner, and their breathing. 

“You can ask him to give you one, you know. If you’re curious.” Gansey’s voice spills soft against her temple, and Blue laughs, turning to press a soft kiss to his shoulder, through the thick fabric of his sweater. That much is allowed.

“Hell no. I’d rather just watch the two of you mark each other up.” She can practically _feel_ Gansey blushing. It’s a nice mental image, if she’s being honest- certainly a better thought than Ronan kissing her neck. It’s happened once or twice, but never in full seriousness, and it’s never gotten to the point of leaving hickeys. The only reason her and Ronan have ever had for kissing is flustering Gansey. 

Well, that’s not quite true. Blue and Ronan tried the whole platonic kissing thing once, because kissing was nice, and since Blue couldn’t exactly kiss Gansey, it seemed kind of unfair that out of their whole triad, she got kissed the least. Blue had her doubts- just because platonic kissing worked for some queerplatonic partners didn’t necessarily mean it would feel right for them, and besides, Ronan wasn’t even interested in girls in the first place. Ronan wasn’t Noah, all soft edges and scattering gentle affection without much care as to where it would fall. Her boy was capable of making almost anything casual, but kissing and commitment were the glaring exceptions. If it managed to not just be completely weird for both of them, Blue wasn’t sure Ronan would be able to write it off as platonic, casual, insignificant; and the last thing she wanted to do was lead him on, or pretend she had some sort of misguided romantic interest in him when that wasn’t the case at all. She loves him, sure, but not like that, not in the way they each love Gansey.

(It ended up just being completely weird and terrible for both of them. Blue had dissolved into helpless giggles about ten seconds in and Ronan had fake gagged. They went out to Dairy Queen after, and Ronan had let her drive the BMW back to Monmouth, urging her to “floor it, maggot, fuck’s sake. You’re just hurting her feelings, might as well put the horsepower to good use.”)

(The zoomed in pictures of the speedometer that Gansey had received over snapchat, captioned “your girl’s driving,” had nearly given him a heart attack.)

“Where is he anyways? If he's just sulking in his room, you can ask him to get out here.” 

Gansey sighs, letting his eyes close, and Blue feels some of the tension in his shoulders slipping away, even as his voice pitches in that one certain way Blue's come to associate with worry. “He's out.”

Blue frowns a little. “Out where?” 

The Barns, maybe, or the empty streets of Henrietta, maybe even St. Agnes or Cabeswater. The forest had been restless lately, cranky and unsettled without it's caretaker, and Ronan has been trying his best to calm it. The sting of Adam's fresh absence has been hitting Ronan the hardest. His classes at U Penn don't start until the end of August, but he'd been offered an internship too good to turn down that started in early June. It's barely been five weeks, but Blue feels the ache as if it's been months. This... thing, this easy, tentative thing the three of them fell into in April- it was never meant to _exclude_ Adam, and while they haven't talked about it yet in so many words, Blue knows that he's welcome the second he gets home, should he want it. She has a feeling he knows it too.

Adam is tentative ground to tread on. Him and Ronan have something brewing under the surface, something that Blue's not sure if she and Gansey can match. But then again, Ronan and Gansey have always had something to them too, an easy familiarity, unspoken trust, a certain wild boyishness that never ceases to take her breath away.

They'll make it work. 

Beside her, she feels Gansey shifting, tensing as he shrugs, anxiety creeping back into his muscles. “I don't know, he didn't tell me where he was going. I think it's a bad night.”

Blue feels something lurch a little inside her ribs, but she just sighs, tracing a few fingertips over the sharp line of Gansey's cheekbone, settling him back down. “I'll talk to him. Get some sleep.” 

Gansey nods in the darkness, curling protectively around her, and within moments she can feel his breathing slow and even, the way it only really does when he's asleep. Gansey is wild heartbeats, five foot something of breathless wonder, shock and awe, boyish energy and gut-wrenching anxiety wrapped up in the things he loves. She’s lucky to have him.

She's lucky to have them both, she thinks, even as she feels her thoughts starting to fog with sleep. Ronan has been better for her than she would have thought. He's never easy, he's always a challenge, but she needs that, in some capacity. Someone who can match her; someone that forces her to keep up. She's still learning how all his edges and angles fit together, but there's an incredible softness under it all that still leaves her breathless and fond. If Gansey is easy comfort and almost-kisses and so much love it scares her, Ronan is the kind of friendship where flipping each other off and saying I love you are one and the same. Together, they're almost more chaos than she can handle.

Below her, in Monmouth’s parking lot, she hears the familiar hum of an engine, the crunch of tires on gravel, the dull thud of a car door slamming. She smiles.

She's asleep before his keys are even in the lock. 

***

When Blue wakes up, it’s to the sound of her boys kissing. 

That happens alarmingly often these days. She blinks her foggy eyes open and rolls over, swatting blearily at whoever is closest, groaning melodramatically. 

“Guys, come on, at least wake me up first.” She rubs sleep from her eyes as Gansey laughs, all out-of-breath and out-of-sorts.

“Sorry, maggot,” Ronan starts, right as Gansey replies, “You needed your rest, Jane.” 

Her eyes finally decide to focus, and she huffs a sardonic sigh, sitting up in bed. Gansey is perched haphazardly in Ronan’s lap, and when he turns to meet her eyes, his are hazy; cheeks flushed, lips kiss-bitten, hair mussed. Ronan looks just as wrecked but twice as smug. Blue's not sure how much of that smugness is satisfaction at successfully tormenting Gansey this early in the morning, and how much of it is just his face. 

“Well,” she says, settling back against the headboard, pulling her knees up to her chest. “Don't stop on my account.”

Ronan laughs, ducking his head down again to nip at Gansey’s jaw, and Blue feels her breath quickening just slightly. It's honestly a little embarrassing exactly how much watching her boys kiss does it for her. Gansey casts his eyes over to her again, all warm hazel and blown pupils, and he's got that _look_ on his face- the one that reads _“help”_ and _“wreck me”_ all at once. She runs one hand through his hair gently, and he leans into the touch. It would be the most natural thing in the world to kiss him right now.

Instead, she clears her throat softly. “Ronan?” 

He lifts his head to meet her eyes, one eyebrow raised in an unspoken question. 

“Kiss him for me, please.” 

Ronan smiles, real and genuine, and that gets her too, a little. Differently, of course, not the way that Gansey all out of sorts like this gets her, but she appreciates it nonetheless. Ronan offers her a mock salute. “On it, Sargent.” 

He doesn't have to ask her anymore exactly how she wants him to kiss Gansey, she simply knows to tell him. These days, he's getting better at reading it on her face, and sometimes she doesn't even need to say anything at all. 

Gansey looks up between them, eyes flicking from Ronan's face to hers, and something about the wonder in his eyes reminds her of Ronan all soft and languid when he gets back from church; of Adam, the curious little tilt of his head and fierce focus in his eyes when Cabeswater decides to whisper its needs through him. 

“Gentle,” Blue murmurs, echoing the quiet kind of love in Gansey’s eyes with a smile of her own. “The next one should be... kind of a polite question. Then the third should be telling, not asking.” 

Ronan rolls his eyes at her, but he does as asked, pulling Gansey in for the first kiss, one hand cupping his jaw tenderly, the other tracing gentle fingertips over Gansey’s spine through the fabric of his sweater. It's something Blue should really be used to by now, but Ronan being sweet still makes her pulse trip. Gansey, on the other hand, is just this side of too wound up to really appreciate the kiss, arms around Ronan's neck, pressing into it in a way she can only describe as endearingly needy. 

Ronan pulls back then, gently, closing his eyes and leaning their foreheads together, and Gansey looks like he's contemplating whining, but he just sighs instead. He works one of his arms free from the embrace, feeling it blindly back behind him towards Blue, and her palm finds his in a heartbeat. 

Ronan kisses him again, _for her_ , and Blue can feel the flush rising to her cheeks this time. It's a question phrased as a kiss, exactly what she'd asked of him, and Gansey is kissing back like he'd rather be screaming yes. He gives her hand a squeeze, fingertips finding the inside of her wrist, feeling over her pulse, and she swears under her breath, shifting closer.

The third kiss ends with her in Ronan's lap, her back resting against the span of his chest. Her breath comes quick as she watches her boys kissing over her shoulder. She tips her head back against Ronan's shoulder. 

They break apart then, and they look to her for direction. They’re so completely _hers_ , and the heady rush of it races down her spine like the dragging whine of the BMW’s engine with her at the helm. 

“Again,” she whispers. “Like you mean it. Tease him.” 

The fourth kiss ends with Ronan's hands steadying her shoulders and Gansey’s slipping down the front of her shorts. 

***

“Come on, girl,” Gansey murmurs, taking his hand off the gear shift and giving the dashboard a loving pat as the Pig grumbles a series of disconcerting noises at him. “Walk it off. You can make it.” 

Ronan snorts from the passenger seat, long legs up on the dash, hands folded behind his head. He takes up so much _space_. “Are you seriously talking to your car?”

Gansey somehow manages to make his resulting pout look childish and defensive all at once as he downshifts, glancing over to frown at Ronan. “Yes, and I don’t see what’s so wrong with that.”

Ronan laughs a little, and Gansey trains his eyes back on the road, the lights of Henrietta growing dimmer as they speed out of the city, giving way to rolling fields and forests draped in darkness. He startles at the feeling of a hand on the back of his neck, Ronan’s fingers pulling at the tension he holds there, and he sighs softly, rolling his shoulders back into the feeling.

“I didn’t say there was anything wrong with it, besides it being embarrassing as fuck, but I mean, it’s you, so that’s nothing new. ‘S cute.”

Gansey rolls his eyes, huffing a soft laugh. “Love you too, Ronan.” He and Blue have been making some progress, but Ronan still needs a good amount of nudging and an elaborate series of cloaking metaphors to phrase his loving sentiments. If Gansey’s being honest, he wouldn’t trade it for the world. 

He catches Ronan shrugging out of the corner of his eye just as he feels the hand tracing his shoulder, down his arm, giving his bicep a soft grip before letting go. Something about this feels just as dangerous as Cabeswater’s caves, as drag racing Kavinsky, as kissing Blue. Ronan this quiet can mean a lot of things.

Ronan this quiet at three am on the Henrietta highway with a hand on Gansey’s knee means something all by itself, a thing apart. It’s the three of them tumbled into his bed at Monmouth, it’s Blue and Ronan wreaking havoc at maximum velocity, it’s tucking himself against Ronan’s side on nights when sleep won’t come easy. 

“Pull over.”

His voice is soft, so soft that Gansey nearly misses it, but then he spots the flat patch of grass on the road shoulder ahead of them. He puts his signal on, slowing and pulling off the road, wrestling with the wheel a little as the Pig tries to argue with him on the subject of wet grass and tire traction. He negotiates with her, putting his shoulders into it a little, and he slows to a stop, putting his parking brake on. 

When he looks up, Ronan is smiling at him, and christ if it isn’t beautiful. His soft brown skin is backlit by the moonlight streaming in through the passenger window, teeth gleaming white, and there’s that same savage air of grace that pulls him in every damn time. 

“What?” he asks, one hand nudging his glasses back up on his nose, the other still resting on the gear shift.

“You just used your turn signal on an empty highway.”

“So?”

“You are such a fucking boy scout. I love you.”

He doesn’t reply at first, he just smirks at the steering wheel, taking a second to reign his wild heart back in a little. Finally he just decides on laughter, unbuckling his seatbelt and beginning the precarious process of climbing over the center console and into Ronan’s lap. 

Ronan’s hands come up to rest low on his hips, thumbs easily finding the sharp jut of his hipbones, rubbing soft circles against them. Gansey’s hands find his shoulders, the skin hot under his fingertips, all tank top straps and raven claw scratches. 

“Well, you’re not wrong. I actually was a boy scout, for a year or so in middle school. Hated it.”

Ronan shrugs, one hand coming up to unfasten the useless top two buttons of Gansey’s polo. “Figures. Something tells me most boy scouts don’t make out with their boyfriends in shitty cars on highway shoulders.”

Gansey doesn’t dignify most of that with a response, instead just choosing to tuck his face against Ronan’s neck, giving his jaw a gentle bite. “She’s not shitty.”

“She's a little shitty. Gansey?”

“Hm?” He looks up sharply, and Ronan pulls his glasses off his face, folding them and tucking them into the glovebox. 

“Shut up and kiss me.”

So he does.

For all of Ronan’s unexpected holiness, Gansey is fairly sure that the way he kisses is nowhere near Catholic. He’s a little bit of a biter, first of all, which shouldn’t have been a surprise looking back on it, but if Ronan’s rough, Gansey’s maybe a little bit of a masochist, so it all works out in the end. He kisses like a proclamation, like he’s trying to kiss his name into Gansey’s mouth and then coax it out again. Right now, though, he’s just six three of _boy_ , and Gansey is weak for it. 

Ronan pulls back then, smile soft instead of sharp as he catches his breath. “Why are you always the one in my lap? Seems kinda unfair. You get all eager and when I've got a lapful of you, it's pretty hot.” 

“You have literally a fucking _foot_ of height on me, Ronan. That's why.”

“Fuck. Remind me to get you to swear more.”

“Noted.”

From there it's kissing and biting, hands shoving up shirts and fumbling over chests, bitten off curses and laughs pressed against skin. Ronan sucks a line of hot kisses down Gansey’s neck, and he just tips his head back to give him more room. Getting kissed by Ronan has a way of making even the ceiling of the Pig look like the Sistine Chapel.

“Wonder what Maggot’s up to right now,” Ronan murmurs between mouthing at Gansey’s pulse point and sucking on his collarbone, and that- that's not fair. Not that Ronan is ever fair, but bringing Jane into things when he's like _this_ \- he whines, hips hitching against Ronan's of their own accord. 

“She's probably asleep,” he breathes, one hand running over the sharp fuzz of Ronan's buzzed head. 

Ronan shrugs, breaking contact for a moment to tug at the bottom of Gansey's rucked-up polo, indicating he wants it off. Gansey complies, tugging it off and tossing it into the driver's seat. 

“Could be. But she could still be up, our shitty sleeping habits have been rubbing off on her.”

Gansey meets his eyes, expression guarded. He can tell Ronan's going somewhere with this, he's just not sure where. The hesitant arch of one brow conveys his unspoken “So?” just as well as words could.

“Bet she's still up. Maybe she's thinking about us.” 

Gansey's pulse trips. That's- that's not new, Ronan bringing her up when they mess around, but it still works him up something fierce.

Blue brings Ronan up too, sometimes. He can never handle it. He's beginning to wonder if it's a conspiracy. 

“What kind of thoughts, exactly?” 

“The kind that ask her to use her hands.” 

Gansey swears, leaning forward and burying his face in Ronan's neck, hands grabbing fistfuls of his tank top. Unfair. He makes a mental note to tell Blue to reign him in. 

It's not that Blue bringing herself off is a particularly _new_ concept, because she's made no qualms about that from day one, it's just a perpetually _spectacular_ one. Ronan just opened that particular vault of his memory, and now his thoughts are full of her breathless little gasps, choked back whimpers, the way she whines when she gets close. Her thighs pressing tight around his hips as she grinds herself down and moans, Henrietta accent coming in thick and heavy as he lets her pin him down and _take_ until she's done, before either of them are even out of their pants. The time she woke him up on accident with her soft little mewls and her warmth and her hips rocking, one hand under the sheets, back arching in his bed at Monmouth as she dealt with the aftermath of a dream. 

Blue swearing and pressing a hand between the layers of her skirts and leggings when Ronan started palming him through his khakis. 

That one time that Blue and Ronan kissed just to tease him, with Blue writhing in pleasure and grinding herself down on Gansey's thigh.

Blue spread out in the back of his Camaro, making eyes at him in her stockings and one of his sweaters.

Blue in his lap right here, in this seat, feeling just as worked up as he is right now. 

“Jesus. If I realized it got you that wound up, I'd have tried it sooner.” Ronan pets one hand down his back, soothing, skin against hot skin. Gansey just sighs and presses a curse into Ronan's collarbone.

“You really love her, don't you?” 

His voice is different then, softer, and Gansey whips his head up to meet his eyes, panic flooding through him. Blue had grown up around this kind of thing, this kind of relationship, she had three moms for God’s sake, she knew how to make these things work, and Gansey...Gansey didn't. She had warned them both about jealousy and open communication, and if Ronan was thinking that Blue was his favorite, or god forbid that he loved her more-

But when he meets Ronan's eyes, there's not even a scrap of jealousy there, or if there is, he sure as hell can't find it. Ronan looks awed, happy even, overwhelmed. Maybe it's just the light. 

“I... yeah. I do. I love her very much.” 

“She's something, alright.” Ronan doesn't even put in the necessary effort to make it sound biting or sarcastic, he just lets the fondness edge his tone.

Gansey rolls his eyes, laughing a little. That's Ronan for “yeah, yeah, I love her too.” And he knows it's true- not in the same way he loves each of them, but different doesn't always mean less. They have something that makes him feel all warm and proud. It's not romantic, Ronan's not into girls and Blue just doesn't like him that way, but Gansey still loves seeing Ronan carrying Blue on his shoulders, or seeing the obvious joy on their faces when Ronan takes her driving, the easy quips and hugs and joking insults. They hold hands sometimes too, and sometimes Blue’s better at managing him at night than Gansey ever was- they'll both come home a little drunk, sure, but tipsy and laughing is better than the BMW in a ditch, or Ronan coming home with bloody knuckles and a split lip. Jane manages to somehow entertain both the softest and hardest parts of Ronan- he's seen them cuddling, and sometimes Ronan dreams her up materials to make clothes with, and they'll sprawl out on the floor of Monmouth and sew together, after she taught him how. Other times, she'll break 110 in the BMW and come home looking the most alive that Gansey's ever seen her, or she'll fight Ronan when he needs it, and she holds her own. She needs him just as much as he needs her, and he's been good for her- Ronan is so fiercely protective that it makes Gansey's heart hurt, but he never offers to fight Blue's battles for her. She just knows he's there if she needs a couple more fists or spare sharp wit. He sharpens her dangerous edges a little, and Gansey thinks that’s how Blue was meant to be. She's coming into her own, they all are, but it's fascinating to watch her feel just a little bit more at ease in her own skin. Blue is the kind of person that thrives off challenge, and Ronan is a handful of trouble with chaos for spare change. 

He loves the way they love each other. He loves the way they love him.  
He loves each of them so terribly much that some days it feels just as big as the quest, as big as the afterlife, as heavy as the nameless, shapeless _wanting_ that hangs oppressively inside his ribs. 

That _want_ has quieted a little since they fell together. It's still there, and he thinks that maybe it'll always be there, that yearning is simply in his nature, that he would be no one without this painful absence of something unidentifiable that kicks up at night. 

(It's always worse at night. He remembers what might have been the worst night, the two of them laying on the floor of Monmouth amongst the miniature Henrietta, staring up at the ceiling. He had asked Ronan if it's possible for someone's soul to get lost when they die, to not find it's way back. Maybe that would explain it, the wanting. Ronan had told him he was being a stupid fuck, but later, they slept tucked together in Ronan's bed. When Ronan thought he was asleep, Gansey laid there stock still and just listened as Ronan whispered a hail Mary over him. He'd prayed then, forehead pressed against one of Gansey's shoulder blades through thin cotton. 

Ronan praying was something Gansey was never meant to hear. There are people like him, people who search high and low for solace and never quite get there. And then there are people like Ronan, who are made of so much faith they're practically brimming with it. Hearing the conviction in his voice was almost enough to make Gansey believe in God. Ronan when sure of something was always an immovable force, grounded in nothing but trust. He made you want to be sure right along with him.

He listened to Ronan pray, voice soft, warm arms wrapped around him, and it made Gansey wonder how long it took him to get to this point, where he could hold a boy in his bed and ask his God to keep him safe, trust that he was loved for all he was. He prayed with respectful reverence that Gansey had never heard on him before; he prayed with the conversational ease of someone meeting up with an old friend. 

He prayed for Gansey; for his safety. _You were supposed to take him, but he's still here. I guess we all make mistakes then, huh? Please, don't change your mind. I know you made us all and everything, and I know you made him the way he is, but I imagine you're pretty busy, and it's been nearly eighteen years. Maybe you don't remember what he's like. But God, he is so alive. If you could see him, you'd know he's where he belongs. He belongs here. You made the right call. Please, keep him breathing for me. I know I'm not exactly your favorite kid, and I'm kind of a huge screw up sometimes, but I need him here. We all do- Adam, Noah, Blue. Keep him breathing._

He prayed for Adam. _Can you help him find... I dunno, something. Rest, maybe. Peace? Let's go with that. He's gonna die before he's thirty if he keeps draining himself dry like that. Go easy on him, okay? He's been through so much. None of it was fair. I doubt you're always the one dealing the deck, because I know you wouldn't give him odds like those. I hope he likes his roommate, and I hope no one hurts him. I hope he's happy. Give him smooth sailing for me if you can, okay? I'm calling in a lot of favors tonight, and I'm sorry. He deserves that, though. I think he already knows, but just in case he doesn't, can you make sure he knows I love him? And that we miss him, we all do._

He prayed for Blue. _Uh, Blue Sargent, she’s a newer one in the address book but she's just as important as everybody else, okay? I hope she passes her driver's test later this week, and I know that's kind of a petty thing to ask for, but it would make her so damn happy. Make sure no freaky occult demonic stuff hurts her, her family's a piece of work and they're all kinda witchy. She's been missing Persephone a lot lately, if you can help her at all, it would mean the world. She means something to me, a really big something, and I need her to know you're looking out for her. Thank you._

He threw in a few words for Noah, for Matthew, for his mother, his father’s spirit, Declan. He didn't pray for himself, but then again, Gansey hadn't really expected him to. He prayed in Latin that Gansey was too tired to translate, little scraps of sentences here and there, and when he finally drifted off, it was to the sound of Ronan's voice.)

“Is the sudden silence a headspace thing or a subspace thing?”

Gansey blinks, eyes focusing back on the boy in front of him. 

“Uh, headspace, sorry.” 

“Damn it, stop thinking so much.” Ronan's fingers trace along Gansey's belt, and he's suddenly very reminded of exactly how hot his skin is, muscles wound tight with tension, pupils blown and breathing heavy. He tugs at Ronan's shirt impatiently, wrestling it off of him, adjusting his hips to fit comfortably over Ronan's, and the other boy moans softly in the process. Gansey grins. Ronan has always been the type to ricochet between eerily quiet and really, really loud.

Ronan has a nice voice and Gansey is lucky enough to have two working ears, so he's pretty set on his preference. 

“Can you, um. Keep talking? I like it when you're loud.” 

Ronan swears, rolling his hips up against Gansey's, setting up a punishing grind that makes him choke on a breath and see stars, maybe. He swears too, forcing his own hips down evenly to match him. 

“How's that feel?” Ronan's question is genuine, if meant to stroke his own ego, so Gansey gives him the honest answer. 

“Incredible.” He doesn't recognize the sound of his own voice in his ears, wrecked and breathless, panting softly. 

Ronan laughs. “Most people would settle for “good,” babe, but I'll take it. God, you feel nice.” 

Gansey shivers, closing his eyes, one hand pressing Ronan's shoulder back against the vinyl seat for a better angle, the other feeling over Ronan's abs. “You too. God, I wish she was here.” 

Ronan bucks his hips a little harder at that, but Gansey knows it's due to him being a wreck and coming apart on top of him rather than the thought of Blue. “Yeah? What would she do?”

Gansey sighs, biting his lower lip, eyes screwed shut as he tries to keep himself coherent and quiet. “God. She’d, uh, talk to us. You know.” 

“Mouth on her. She's pretty good at dirty talk, we need to compare notes one of these days. She'd be here, y’know. Right over there in the driver's seat.”

“She'd, um. Lean back against the driver's side window, probably. One leg down by the floorboard, she'd stretch the other over the center console, I think. And she'd-”

Ronan hums softly. The mental image Gansey's describing does literally less than nothing for him, because _girl_ , because _Blue_ , but the look on Gansey's face and the way he's just fucking writhing and choking back all these little moans? That definitely does something for him. 

“Keep going.” He urges him on gently, one hand dropping to rest soothingly on Gansey's thigh, even as he grinds up against him in a slow, filthy sine wave that leaves Gansey gasping. 

“Fuck, Ronan. She's not even here, am I being gross? I'm probably being gross.” 

Ronan snorts, biting his tongue to keep from moaning as Gansey fucking _squirms_ in his lap. “Dude, no. She has a thing for that.” 

Gansey’s eyes go wide, and his hips buck once, twice, aborted little desperate half thrusts, and he lurches forward, burying his face in Ronan's neck, whispering against his skin. “Fuck, fuck, Ronan, I'm. God.” 

He's always quiet when he comes, as opposed to Blue, who's loud as shit, bordering on obnoxious in Ronan's opinion, but Gansey likes to just grind or thrust or fuck his way through it, dragging it out as long as he can. Ronan lets him, eyes closed, moaning as his hands find Gansey's stuttering hips, pressing him down and helping him grind through it, frantic and fucking filthy. He barely lasts through that, and when Gansey tucks his smaller body down against the floorboard, kneeling between his legs, eyes dark and face flushed, he groans, working a hand into Gansey's hair.

He's gone before his boxers are even down, Gansey fucking _mouthing_ at him through the patch of wet fabric at the head, looking up at Ronan through his lashes. 

He bites out a curse through gritted teeth and tugs Gansey's hair without really realizing he's doing it, but since Gansey's their resident kinky fuck, it just has the same end result it always does- Gansey moaning, husky and genuine, hands pinning Ronan's hips down as he looks up at him. 

“Fuck, babe,” he mutters, hips rolling dirty though the last of it. He gives Gansey's hair a harsher tug and raises an eyebrow when he fucking whimpers. 

“Easy now,” he mutters, just the right amount of sass as he closes his eyes and lets his head fall back, catching his breath, letting his pulse climb back down even as he's still a mess in his boxers. Damn, that was a good one.

When he opens his eyes again, Gansey's a bit calmer too, shameless heat of the moment having finally died down. Instead he just looks a little guilty, a little embarrassed, eyes downcast and a weird persistent frowny tilt to his mouth. 

“Quit with the Ganseyface.”

Hazel eyes snap up to meet his, confused. “Beg pardon?”

“You're pouting. Get in the back.”  
Ronan rolls his eyes. God, one of these days him and Blue are actually gonna take their boy apart enough that he can shut the hell up and just _stop thinking_ for five fucking minutes after he comes his brains out.

Hasn't happened yet. 

Gansey isn't moving. Ronan sighs, reaching forward and running a hand through Gansey's hair, reassuring, or at least he hopes. Gansey must understand then, because his eyes widen a little and he nods, affording Ronan a dazzling little smile, hauling himself back up on Ronan's lap. He hesitates a little before ducking in for a chaste little kiss, practically as first grade as it gets. Ronan rolls his eyes but gives him a real smile in return as they part, and then Gansey's scrambling off his lap and up over the gearshift and into the backseat and Ronan maybe curses a little and calls him a bony short little fucker and Gansey maybe flips him off a little in return. 

Ronan gets out and climbs into the backseat the right way, and then they're laying down in the backseat of the Pig all wrapped in darkness. Ronan lays out on the backseat and Gansey awkwardly lays half of top of him and it's not the most comfortable position by any means but they make it work. It's not like it's the first time they've done this, laying curled up together in the back of the Camaro. When your best friend has insomnia and he won't let you drive his car, pulling over to nap on highway shoulders becomes an eventual necessity, the first time he falls asleep at the wheel and almost gets you killed- but it's the first time they've done it after sex. Normally Gansey will sit in his lap for a while and Ronan will lean their foreheads together and maybe they'll make out a little as they both climb back down, and then Gansey will decide it's time to go back to Monmouth. 

Today isn't quite normal for them, Ronan muses, one hand fussing with Gansey's hair a little as he looks out through the window opposite them at the stars on the horizon. It's late enough that the sky's fading from black to navy, and with the windows down to air the smell of sex out of the car, there's a nice cool breeze going that makes Gansey nuzzle closer to his warmth and the sound of Henrietta crickets. 

Ronan fishes an arm up into the passenger seat, finding his phone, trying not to disturb the sleepy weight of Gansey on his chest. He angles his phone up above them, working with the strange contours of the car and limited lighting, but he manages to get a decent selfie. He sends it to Blue and Gansey, whose phone chirps from somewhere in the driver's seat. 

He gets Blue's screenshot notification a moment later. 

_(Talked about you again, maggot.)_

Her reply is too dark to really see anything besides the caption, which is just a winking emoji alongside the pouting and heart eyes emojis. 

He screenshots it, just so she gets the notification, and then he chucks his phone into the driver's seat, settling back down against Gansey.

About one time out of ten that they fuck around, Gansey will get like this, quieter and more vulnerable and embarrassed, and they'll need to give him some time to settle back into his skin. The three of them are still figuring out what that is, the current running theory being subspace, and it's easier when Blue's there, but Ronan can manage. 

“Hey,” he murmurs, voice soft. “You feelin’ any better?” 

Gansey startles a little at the interrupted silence, turning his face up to look up Ronan, and Ronan swears he feels something knotting itself up in his chest, because _fuck_ , he's beautiful. 

Gansey nods a little, half smiling, tracing a few fingertips over Ronan's collarbones, the same way he always does with Blue. “I think so, yes. I'm... sorry for spacing on you.”

There we go. Ronan pets a hand down his back. “No need to apologize, just glad you're back. Got any idea why you went all Carmen Sandiego on me this time?”

That pulls a laugh from Gansey, and Ronan finds himself laughing a little too. Gansey shrugs. “No, not really. You weren't pushing me or anything. I think it just happens sometimes.”

“Okay, good, I was about to ask, make sure you were okay with everything.” 

Kavinsky flashes briefly in his mind, lounging on the hood of his goddamn Mitsu, sleazy used car salesman smile, _“Consent is overrated.”_

Nothing ever happened between them, but Ronan smiles a little to himself. _“The difference between us and him is that we matter.”_ Excelsior- onwards and upwards.

Gansey nods, pecking a gentle kiss against Ronan's stubbly jaw. “You were perfect. Thank you.”

Ronan laughs, a little prideful, and he holds Gansey close for a second longer before pulling his arms away and wiggling a little, getting Gansey to scoot off of him so that he can stretch. “Feeling’s mutual. Okay, so. Drive back, showers, we can go surprise the maggot and pick her up for breakfast somewhere, say hi to Maura and Calla and everyone. You feeling up to it?”

Gansey smiles all bright and nods, getting out of the car and stretching as well before getting in the driver's seat again, shirtless and rumpled and gorgeous and driving a classic car. 

Ronan has really, really good taste in boys.

He hauls his ass up into the passenger seat, fastening his seatbelt, and Gansey doesn't bother rolling up the windows as the Pig growls to life, pulling out slowly on the highway and then flooring it to build up his speed without an on ramp. Ronan has to yell to be heard over the wind and the engine, but he finds himself not even caring a little. 

“You good to drive?”

Gansey evaluates his level of tiredness for a second before nodding. “I'm good. You can drive to Jane’s though, we'll take the BMW.” 

Ronan hums his agreement and puts his hand over Gansey's on the gear shift, and they drive home like that, just them and the night and the horsepower beneath them.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm on tumblr @leogansey come say hi! kudos & comments mean the world, y'all


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